Time is running out to catch Silver Dollar City’s National Harvest Cowboy Festival, which runs for one more wee at the 1880s theme park. Once the fall festival closes, the park will turn its attention to An Old Time Christmas, which unofficially opens Friday, Nov. 3 with the annual White Glove event, followed by the official opening Nov. 4.

National Harvest Cowboy Festival

From now through Saturday, Oct. 28, Silver Dollar City will continue to feature the park’s more than 40 rides and attractions. As well as live shows, the park features 125 visiting craftsmen, including Best of Missouri Hands juried artists, joining Silver Dollar City’s 100 traditional craftsmen. The craftsmen demonstrate leather-working, copper color art, stone art, fiddle-making, basket-weaving, gourd-painting and jewelry-making.

Featured western music acts include Western Music Association seven-time Female Performer of the Year Belinda Gail, three-time Group of the Year Miss Devon and the Outlaw, Entertainer of the Year and two-time Female Performer of the Year Kristyn Harris, plus the Malpass Brothers and the Home Rangers. The Western Barn Dance also returns, giving all guests a chance to dance to a live band.

Watercolor artist and “Gunsmoke” star Buck Taylor also returns to show off his, as well as several other artists’, work at Buck Taylor’s Cowboy Emporium, at the Silver Dollar City Frisco Barn. Guests can enjoy cowboy-inspired crafts like saddle-making, leather-crafting, Native American jewelry-making, antler art, moccasin-crafting and turkey feather painting.

Chuck wagon historian and chef Kent Rollins, a cattle rancher and chuck wagon cook whose talents have landed him on the Food Network’s “Chopped,” “Throwdown with Bobby Flay,” and “Food Fighters,” will again show off his skills throughout the festival with daily demonstrations on the art of cooking up authentic, chuck wagon meals.

Once the park is all set for the holiday season, Silver Dollar City will again host its exclusive White Glove benefit event, which not only serves as a “sneak preview” for An Old Time Christmas, but also as a way to raise funds for Care For Kids, project of the Silver Dollar City Foundation and Care For Kids, Friday, Nov. 3.

The park’s tradition of having every nook and cranny gone over with a “white glove” the night before opening for a new festival has a long history, according to Silver Dollar City spokeswoman Martha Bohner.

“The white glove stems from when (co-founder) Jack Herschend came back from the military,” Bohner told the Branson Tri-Lakes News.

She said before every opening, they’d go through the park, checking to make sure everything was perfect and going through dress rehearsals. It was a routine that quickly became known as “the white glove.”

“We’ve been using that term for 50 years,” she said.

In 2010, park officials recognized the opportunity to open up the park and share the white glove experience with the community and raise funds for the school program Care For Kids.

The White Glove event will kick off with a Christmas feast, complete with prime rib and all the trimmings, followed by the chance to be among the first to see the all-new Christmas In Midtown, which includes 30 angels, animated reindeer, three light tunnels, two 40-foot long moving trains, dozens of stars and snowflakes, and a 90-foot tree, all created at Silver Dollar City.

Christmas in Midtown is the largest single lighting expansion in the more than two decades of the festival. With 1.5 million new lights, the park’s total now tallies to 6.5 million lights for the Christmas season.

Those in attendance at the White Glove event will also get the chance to experience Rudolph’s Holly Jolly Light parade, as well as the wildly popular holiday favorite “A Dickens’ Christmas Carol.”

The White Glove event special benefit for Care For Kids is exclusive to only 400 people, and there are still a few tickets available. For tickets and more information, call 800-831-4386. For more information on the Care For Kids program, visit silverdollarcityfoundation.com.